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43. New Year 1943 – A Final Party
43. New Year 1943 – A Final Party
“I wish to give a final New Year's Eve celebration,” Dan says sitting in rocking chair across from Ali on sofa in 2A on a mid December day.
“What's with the final, Dan?”
“I do not imply I shall die this coming year. But, at 83 and my powers weakening, it will be the last celebration I shall have the energy to do."
“OK. May I organize it?"
“OK. May I organize it?"
“My dear, dear girl, of course, who else?”
The Bash as Ali names it will be at Dan's, and Luigi will cater the affair. Ali asks Brenda and Lorna to help. The guests are invited to arrive at 8 PM .
A little before 7:30 PM, December 31st, Lorna, Brenda and Ali relax on sofa while Dan, dressed in formal black suit and gray tie on white shirt, sits in rocking chair, with his black silk socks over feet making a striking contrast to the wavy, red-stripe rococo rug that Ali has recently layed in place of his faded old brown rug.
Lorna is in a new green dress that features high white collar, blue belt with no metal, and her skirt edge an inch below knee. Brenda, out to impress Dr Stan, is dressed older, in brown skirt and white silk blouse that tastefully does not emphasize her very good figure, and a matching padded-shoulders jacket. She has a single pearl about neck. Lorna is not wearing her usual Star of David, having thought about it and decided that since Brenda and Ali are not Jewish, and everybody knows she is, there is no need for it. Ali is dressed informal in slacks and sweater that does not mask her small but curvy breasts. Lorna and Brenda have been, this afternoon, at Hedy Goldberg's beauty salon on Jerome Avenue where Lorna's long black hair got nicely conditioned, no single hair out of place and its black is really blackened, more than her natural while Brenda got an up-sweep hard perm making her head look sculpted.
For the party Ali has brought her table upstairs and put it together with Dan's in center of living room and the apartment has been spic & spanned by the girls with the windows and doorways hung with Welcome 1943 bangles in varying colors and designs.
The air is moist Bronx winter steam-heat from the stand-up radiator 
and single 4-inch diameter floor-to-ceiling pipe in corner – both painted metallic silver. A pipe radiator is also in kitchen and bathroom.
and single 4-inch diameter floor-to-ceiling pipe in corner – both painted metallic silver. A pipe radiator is also in kitchen and bathroom.
By Dan's settee, opposite side of room from sofa, on his bed table is a phonograph and a stack of 78 rpm disc records. Dan's portable radio is next to it.
“My dear, dear girls, allow me to listen to the news. It is now time for Gabriel Heatter.” Dan gets up and goes to switch on the radio which is always set to his favorite station that has Gabriel Heatter and Arthur Godfrey.
“My dear, dear girls, allow me to listen to the news. It is now time for Gabriel Heatter.” Dan gets up and goes to switch on the radio which is always set to his favorite station that has Gabriel Heatter and Arthur Godfrey.
The timing is perfect with Gabriel Heatter's opening salutation almost his logo:
“Good evening everyone – there's good news tonight on this last day of what has been a bad-news year. On Guadalcanal far in the southwest Pacific our marines are cleaning up the Japanese resistance in a campaign that is being likened to the Battle Gettysburg North Africa our GIs have entered Algiers
"And in Russia merican
"Now allow me to stop for a brief message from the sponsor.”
Dan's door resounds with a loud knock and Nicola's Italian shout. “Hey le’me in wit' da eats from Luigi's.”
Nicola needs to make 2 trips to bring the food and drink. The girls arrange it on center table. A big heaping platter of plain spaghetti, medium thick, another of macaroni. Also a saucer of Luigi's sauce of olive oil, unprocessed tomatoes, limes and further flavored with oregano and peppers. And a large plain pizza - 20 inch (c.50 cm) diameter that will be reheated later just before everyone eats.
Ali goes to kitchen and gets fresh fruits & vegetables cut to bite-size bits in a big bowl. Paper plates and wood chopsticks are on table too. Nicola on last trip brings bottles of red Chianti and dry white wine. Ali decreed no hard drinks and no beer, in order to prevent drunkenness and diabetes. There are no soft drinks, no ice cubes but a big carafe of water, charcoal purified and cooled by the outside December air. Also a plate of 12 unsalted, unflavored matzo 8-by-10-inch, and a saucer of gefilte fish with eye-smarting, tongue-stinging white horseradish. And lots of lemon wedges for flavoring for the Tetley tea.
These are all arranged on the double tables in mid living room. Napkins are everywhere; cloth, not paper, because Ali wants to protect the trees. And then the cake she baked using fructose for the sugar and garnished by unsalted cream cheese with strawberries and blackberries on top.
At 8 PM the guests start arriving: Professor Edwardes in formal black suit then Moyshe wearing his yarmelke in white shirt, brown slacks and necktie, and Dr Stan in hospital physician jacket because he is on call all night.
Despite his wanting everyone to just call him. Stan, it ends up Dr Stan anyway and always.
The RSVP cards had returned a No from Alfonse who was obligated to take his wife to a party and also preferred she not meet Ali for his own reason. The downstairs super's helper Sam promised to come up briefly later. He is busy stoking the furnace in basement so all the tenants will get good steam heat for New Year's eve.Lorna greets guests and puts coats & hats in Dan's hall closet. Brenda guides each guest to sit, and once everybody is in place, Ali stands up.
"Dan asked me to welcome this simple celebration. As we bring in 1943, it is easy to complain and worry about a world at war and all the other problems. But Dan wants to join with you - and I do too - to simply appreciate our joy of just being alive at this moment where we have steam heat to warm us in winter, and good healthy food from Luigi's - thanks to Nicola. Dan did not ask me to say he is 83 and this is his final party - not that he will leave us - I hope not. But, rather than sudden, unexpected, unobserved stopping of a life, he wants to put a dot at the end of its sentence." Suddenly Ali stops, a confused look on her face and goes to Dan in his rocking chair and kneels to hug him and cry silently.
Everyone is quietly respectful of her sudden confusion.
Dan puts his right hand on her head, acknowledging her love. After a minute Brenda gets up from her sofa seat and helps Ali to the bathroom where she can get herself together.
Five minutes later they return and the party is on.
Brenda goes to her phonograph - a portable that one can load with ten record discs. She puts on a mix of pop music, all instrumental, because, having discussed it with Ali, they decided this party is not going to be disturbed by attention being called to a singer or a lyric. She starts with Glenn Miller's In the Mood, followed by his American Patrol and then Blue Moon, which is an unusual arrangement because the tremendously popular Lorenz Hart lyrics demand a singer but, Brenda thinks, it is one of the qualities she likes about Glenn Miller that he does these songs as instrumentals only that she sometimes wants for a party. And - Wow! - she exclaims in her mind, What a sensaysh trumpet solo!
The recordings automatically dropping into place, one after another, give her about 40 minutes before needing to load a new set.
The party starts with guests and host getting plates of food and drink and going off in small conversations. It favors everyone seeking seats because it is more enjoyable to eat, sitting.
Dan whose walking has become slow and unsteady, stays in rocking chair while Ali gets a plate of his favorites - spaghetti with the sauce, a slice of pizza, the salad topping his plate and a glass of white wine diluted half strength. She puts it on a small table and speaks to Professor Edwardes on the sofa across the table facing them.
"Professor, let me introduce Dan?" Edwardes extends his hand across the table. "Mr. Manasse! Ali tells me you are a playwright."
"Well, I try. I hear you are a sociologist."
"I took my degree in sociology so I could learn to earn a living teaching in colleges but my real interest is civilization. And I am interested, now, in Psychohistory."
Ali enters the conversation: "Izzat the psychology of history or a history for psychotics?" It is a feeble joke and she knows it.
Edwardes chuckles. "Actually, your second suggestion is not far off."
Dan jumps in, "I think I know what the Professor is getting at. Have either of you read or heard In the Country of the Blind, the One-Eyed Man is king?"
"Why not the One-Eyed Woman?" Asks Ali.
Edwardes laughs. "Yes! Yes! Consider: What if you were suddenly put inside an insane asylum without psychiatrists and sealed off so no one inside could get out and no one outside could get in and neither knew about the other? How could you be sure you were the sane one?
Dan smiles. "Ah, Professor! You are getting into relativity, are you not?"
"Yes, and I imply that our civilization is run by strong-arm maniacs, and that the really sane persons are those like we three, who the average man on the street considers crazy."
Ali stands up. "OK, now I circulate as a good hostess should."
In the corner by the steam radiator, Brenda sits with Dr. Stan, their food plates and drinks on a small table between them.
"Miss Bordon, you are changed from the girl I treated in the emergency. Do you feel it?"
"Well, doctor, I think what you saw that day was from my temporarily being non compos mentus. Had you known me before, you would not see such a change." She looks towards the phonograph. "Oh listen! Shall we dance?"
There is almost no dance space in their corner of the room but they can hold each other and move in the small area. The doctor is clumsy as a dance partner and Brenda immediately takes the lead. Also, she arranges that they are body to body, almost cheek to cheek and her faint fragrance she paid much for at Bloomingdale's downtown puts Dr. Stan in a dither. I want this woman, he thinks.
Lorna sits facing Moyshe, who is embarrassed to be with her, in another cozy corner. It is their first time alone since the Brenda affair.
Lorna reaches her right hand to his left cheek, tenderly touching. "I'm happy to be here with you, Moyshe, happy for these moments."
At that moment, the Glenn Miller Blue Moon goes on, and Moyshe asks "Lorna! Will you dance?"
They stand and hold each other, and dance slowly in a very small circle, with his both hands on her low back clasping her front to his, and their lips touching.
Ali who had been heading to join them stops. "Wow!" she exclaims under breath. "Young love! It sizzles". She heads towards the other corner where Brenda and Dr. Stan are just sitting down.
Pulling up a small chair to sit she exclaims: "Hi guys, aren't you the twosome?"
"Ali, you kill me! I never heard anyone call me a guy."
"Sounds very futuristic to me," comments the doctor, adding, "but right as an expression."
"Call me Little Miss Future! Even the name shortening of my true Alison to just Ali."
"Aw, Ali, everyone is shortening names now. Did you read the latest Captain Marvel? It takes place in a future where Captain Marvel gets weak and it turns out because Billy shortened the Shazam to Shaz."
"Are you young ladies still reading the comic books?" Dr. Stan asks curiously.
"Why not?" Ali replies. "If the content is scientific - as Captain Marvel's is - comics can be an adult genre." She stands. "OK, just wanted to check the two of you are happy. As hostess, I got to circulate. Bye-bye! Don't be naughty but if you have to, then use precautions."
At 11:30 the party quietens. Super's helper Downstair's Sam arrives, and Ali decides an organized activity is called for. She seats everyone - on sofa, chairs, and settee - in a circular row and she sits at center. "OK, folks, we play not quite a game. We are here to celebrate a New Year's, 1943. I want to hear your ambition for the new year. Let's start with Dan."
"My dear, dear girl, and esteemed guests: given my age and limited expectancy, I just would like to stay alive, as I am now, with my dear girl and you friends, for 1943."
Professor Edwardes sitting at the window end of the sofa is next: "For 1943, I have a hope rather than an ambition. That this war will result in the withering away of the nation-state replaced by a United World and a government whose mission is social welfare, lifting the weakest and poorest up based on the the technological productivity the war is generating. I am reading R. Buckminster Fuller's vision of a world where mechanical computers replace experts and every man is jack of all things and no masters. Let 1943 be its beginning."
Nicola follows: "I'm a always a think 'bout Italia. I wanna 1943 see peace. That'sa all."
Super's helper Sam, third man on the sofa speaks: "Y'all know I'm a man of color, from the South. My father was born a slave and I a late baby. I hope 1943 will be the start of the end of Jim Crow. The Negro people need education, they need culture; but before that they need equality with the Man. So that's my idea."
Lorna is sitting on Sam's left. Her turn. "I'm sorry not to have anything important to say. I want 1943 to be my year to learn to be a beautician. My parents gave permission and I shall go after-hours to beauty school, and Hedy Goldberg promised a part time job at her shop. So that's my ambition"
Next to her, Moyshe. "I hope to start Yeshiva University next year in September. I want to be a modern Rabbi. I want to teach my fellow Jews to be more tolerant, to get involved socially. I think we Jews ought to be getting together with Sam's people." He looks at Sam who smiles seriously at him. "In the bible we were slaves to Pharaoh. We are like brothers. So that's my idea."
Switching to Ali's right side of room, next, Dr Stan speaks from his chair. "I finish my residency training in June. Then I go into psychoanalytic training. It involves my own psychoanalysis and then I can help others with each one's self analysis."
He turns to Brenda on his left. She glances at Lorna then at Ali for their understanding and sees it. "I just want to learn everything. I want to read every book, do science, whatever ...."
Ali is last. "Some of you know I work for a future I call science civilization. It is a place where everything depends on the scientific method of observation, hypothesis, experiment and proof. A society whose goals will be furthering our knowledge of the universe, colonizing our solar system starting with Moon and Mars, making a socially good life on earth like the Professor is hoping for based on advanced technology, limiting population growth and being kind to each other and also being kind to the other animals and preserving the plants and inanimates. Well, that's all." She looks at the clock on the wall. "Hey! One minute to midnight." Standing, she pours the wine or the pure water water as requested for each one's glass and, as the new year chimes in, they all drink to it. Shortly after, the party is over.
For next, click 12.44 Masturbating Eddie
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